Scientists aboard the NOAA research vessel Oscar Dyson in the North Pacific have sighted a creature of great rarity: a white killer whale has been spotted in Alaska's Aleutian Islands. It appeared to be a healthy, adult male about 25 to 30 feet (7 to 9 meters) long and weighing as much as 10,000 pounds (4,500 kilograms)."I had heard about this whale, but we had never been able to find it," said Holly Fearnbach, a research biologist with the National Marine Mammal Laboratory in Seattle who photographed the rarity. "When you first looked at it, it was very white," she said Thursday. Further observation showed that while the whale's saddle area was white, other parts of its body had a subtle yellowish or brownish color.

NOAANOAA

Read the whole story in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration website